If you didn’t grow watermelons in your garden this year, this Saturday is your chance to taste truly local watermelons. Local watermelons are maturing under our hot August days, and we begin to see watermelons of all varieties at roadside stands.

I love driving down the highway and stopping at a farmer’s stand to purchase something you know came from their hands and their field and not South Texas or Mexico. This Saturday is our area’s annual opportunity for a fun day filled with watermelon items and free, ice-cold watermelon slices for everyone.

Plains, as it has done for 19 years, celebrates its annual Yoakum County Watermelon Round-up the Saturday before Labor Day, which this year is Aug. 30. Plains is not too far a drive from Lubbock, just over an hour on U.S. 82 and U.S. 380. If you travel to Carlsbad or Ruidoso, New Mexico, you know the Dairy Queen at Plains as a refreshment stop.

The Round-up runs from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. with something for everyone — watermelon eating and watermelon seed-spitting contests, pony rides, water slides and a train. Activities include 5K and 10K runs, car and bike shows, a biker Poker run, 100 arts and crafts vendors and 20 food booths. Guests are encouraged to bring lawn chairs for live entertainment all day including a magician; past crowds have numbered 5,000 to 10,000. For details call (806) 592-1528 or go to Facebook.com/watermelonroundup.

In any given year, Texas ranks third or fourth in U.S. production of watermelons. Florida and Georgia are first and second, repsectively; Texas and California have the next highest acreage.

Texas plants 36,000 acres annually and because our latitudes stretch from 26 to 37 degrees N, there is a wide range of harvest dates. Sequential harvests begin in April in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, June and July in Winter Garden and East Texas, August in the Rolling Plains, and late summer and early fall harvests in the southern High Plains. Over 100 Texas counties produce watermelon commercially. Yoakum County grows about 2,000 acres of watermelon — 300 acres of seeded and another 1,400 acres of seedless watermelon. All production is irrigated.

The top five producing countries are China, Turkey, Iran, Egypt, and the United States. Total U.S. domestic watermelon production for 2013 was 2.6 billion pounds, importing 1.3 billion pounds mainly from Mexico and Central America. Average American per capita fresh watermelon consumption is 15.5 pounds; women tend to eat more watermelon than men.

So this weekend, get out of the city, make a fun day trip west to Plains and take part in the watermelon festival while supporting area agriculture and Texas growers. Maybe increase your annual watermelon consumption with free, ice-cold slices of watermelon!

ELLEN PEFFLEY TAUGHT HORTICULTURE AT THE COLLEGE LEVEL FOR 28 YEARS, 25 OF THOSE AT TEXAS TECH, DURING WHICH TIME SHE DEVELOPED TWO ONION VARIETIES. SHE IS NOW THE SOLE PROPRIETOR OF FROM THE GARDEN, A MARKET GARDEN FARMETTE. YOU CAN EMAIL HER AT GARDENS@XANADU.COM